Minda Corporation, the BSE listed automotive component manufacturer, on Tuesday opened its new Spark Minda Technical Centre (SMIT) at Chaken, near Pune with an investment of Rs 60 crore.

The Gurgaon-headquartered firm is gearing to meet demands of the growing automobile industry with the government’s push for electric vehicles or EV by 2030.

The company, which was targeting export revenues to the tune of Rs 500 crore by 2021 from Rs 150 crore clocked last fiscal, has currently got an export book order of Rs 400 crore.

“SMIT is significant step towards investment in technology leadership and creates a robust platform to emerge as a system solution provider in the growing automotive industry,” Ashok Minda, CEO at Minda Corporation told Financial Chronicle.

He said the company had invested a total of Rs 60 crore in setting up SMIT and the company would continue to invest more in the latest technology. The new Centre will pursue opportunities in the area of new generation technologies like connected, autonomous, electrified mobility solutions, body control and multi-function controllers, smart security and vehicle access solutions etc.

It would also explore incubation of future technologies like deep learning, artificial intelligence, internet of things, smart vehicles technologies, prognosis and diagnosis etc.

“We have an export order of Rs 400 crore in our hands from European countries for a range of our products,” Minda said, adding that the company’s sales revenues were Rs 4,000 crore last fiscal.

“Our sales revenues have been growing at a CAGR of 20 per cent for the last four years while the industry has clocked 8-10 per cent,” Minda pointed out.

SMIT will foster the technology development journey of the existing group businesses and enable their initiatives towards electronification, he said.

The Centre will also nurture innovations to create breakthrough solutions tailored to address the market requirements, Mind added.

The R&D centre is equipped with latest test and measurement equipment, development tool chains and environment and fully operational laboratory for supporting development of embedded software and hardware.

“The state-of-the-art EMI-EMC (Electromagnetic interference & Electromagnetic compatibility) test facility will cater to complete suite of design and product validation tests,” Minds said, adding that starting with 75 engineers, the staffing would be ramped up to 150 by the end of the year.